Healthcare… Have the Dems Worn You Out?

Healthcare

By: Esther Petersen

I am afraid that we have been proven right.  I have attended five Tea Party type events this year and the theme, for most of the people I talked to was, “it all about control”.  At the very first Tea Party event on April 15^th, it was TARP and the Omnibus spending plan that were front and center in the targeted anger.  That is interesting to note as TARP was passed under the leadership of the GOP and Omnibus was under the leadership of the Democrats.  Healthcare reform (or take over) was still on the “far-off” drawing board with Cap and Trade.  Two big, bad, bills looming in, what we hoped, was a very distant future.  If only……..

 Fast forward to the end of September and look at where we are now.  Cap and Trade was rammed through the House of Representatives and the Healthcare legislation has at least four different bills floating around.  “We the People” did our job throughout the summer with our phones calls and emails, and we certainly made our position know loudly and clearly through our unprecedented town hall participation.  Oh yes, we read up on as much as we could, we made no pretences as to our positions, we fought hard all summer, and ended with a massive march on Capitol Hill.    And what has happened since?  Have our Representatives decided to actually listen to us and to do what we demanded of them?  No, they most certainly have not.  In fact, they are now putting a gag order on Humana, a private business, which prevents Humana from passing on information to its customers that is backed up by the CBO!  That is correct!  Humana is not lying to its customers, they are passing on information that has been verified by the Congressional Budget Office, yet the long and ever far reaching arm of the Federal Government has told them to “shut up”. 

 If only that were the only thing that was obscene about the moves made since the August recess.  Now, what is referred to as the Baucus bill will include not only a substantial fee, but possible JAIL TIME for people who do not purchase insurance.  Let us think about that for a moment.  It has been shown through interviews and speeches that President Obama, Representatives Pelosi and Frank, and Senators Bernie Sanders and Dennis Kucinich to name a few, are all supportive of a single payer health system.  The problem is, the American people do not agree.  The American people want healthcare reform not a “government takeover”.  So what is the solution?  Why that is simple, force the public into a single payer system over a period of time and do it by making the current system so obnoxious that people begin to think there is no other option.  Boom, there it is.  They gain full control and we are stuck with it.  If this is not the case then why would they be opposed to the options such as opening up state borders and tort reform that would cost the American public nothing?  Why would they be opposed to free market solutions?  Why would they be opposed to breaking the bill down into much smaller, less intrusive, easier to read bills?  The answer, I am afraid, is becoming more and more obvious.  They do not want to just reform healthcare; they want to completely transform it into something we in this country have never seen before.  They ultimately want to control it, therefore they will not listen to us and reform it slowly with common sense moves.

 What can we do, then?  Are we doomed to accept what they are about to force on us?  I say “NO”.  I say that we must insist that “if” they do what I think they are going to do and use reconciliation to pass this bill, we must demand that the new people we WILL elect in 2010 must immediately begin working to repeal anything that moves healthcare out of our hands and into the hands of the Federal Government.  My friends, I feel we are in for a long fight.  Are you up for it?

 

 

Steve Buyer learns about The Apollo Alliance

Who writes the bills? Who is the Apollo Alliance? A high school student asks Congressman Steve Buyer – if HR 3200 passes, and salaries for physicians are capped, what motivation does he have to enter med school?

 

Danville, IN, Town Hall with Rep. Steve Buyer (R), cont.

More questions:

Part 5:

Part 6 (SCHIP):

 

He tells it like it is

I, David William Hedrick, a member of the silent majority, decided that I was not going to be silent anymore. So, I let U.S. Congressman Brian Baird have it. I was one questioner out of 38, that was called at random from an audience that started at 3,000 earlier in the evening. Not expecting to be called on, I quickly scratched what I wanted to say on a borrowed piece of paper and with a pen that I borrowed from someone else in the audience minutes before I spoke. So much for the planned talking points of the right wing conspiracy.

 

A Change We Can Believe In

A quick note on this… It was written at the end of April.. to help put the article in context. 

“A Change We Can Believe In” by Frank

 American citizens came together on April 15^th and participated at Tea Parties around the U.S. to tell our representatives to uphold the Constitution of the United States and the foundation on which our country was formed.  Our thoughts about what the Tea Parties represented to us are as follows:

 What began years ago, is continually changing America, and has accelerated during our lifetime are the following;  The Federal State and local governments, step by step, have taken over our lives becoming stronger and larger than anytime in U.S. history creating unsustainable debt and massive government programs catering to special interests.  Our representatives in Washington and at the State level have put the U.S. in a downward spiraling debt to which we may never recover unless we vote and replace those in our legislative body who are growing this debt.  Quoted from the “Principles of Liberty; The highest level of prosperity occurs when there is a free market economy and a minimum of government regulations.” America could easily plunge into a severe depression unless we limit government spending and taxation. Our liberties will be gone and our standard of living, the envy of the world, will be reduced to subsistence   Morality and a religious foundation that America was built on are no longer taught in the public schools. (Private and charter schools are the exception.) We now contend with a new world order and a real threat to American culture, the Constitution and our liberties.

 Why have millions of immigrants come to America?  Because they want to live in a country that was built on the “Principles of Liberty” which are written about in the book “A Miracle that Changed the World, the 5000 Year Leap”. Learn how adherence to these principles during the past 233 years has brought about more progress than was made in the previous 5,000 years.”  Please read the 28 “Principles of Liberty” listed at the end of these comments.  Also, a must read is “Liberty and Tyranny”, by Mark Levin.  Even President Obama’s mother knew to send her young son back to America to get a better education and standard of living than Indonesia could offer him.

 So if the Principles of Liberty, our Constitution and the foundation of America are such a blessing to the human race, why are we allowing our elected representatives to grow the government and subject us to intolerable debt that will put our generation and the next generations into economic slavery?  That is a question all of us must ask ourselves.  Who is to blame?  Probably most of us are to blame.  Is it too late to turn this ship around?  Our Constitution and the wisdom of our Founding Fathers gave us a system of checks and balances adopted to prevent the abuse of power. The Tea Parties were the first step. What we can do is contact our representatives and remind them about the Principles of Liberty and how our Constitution is not being upheld.   We can express our views and remind our representatives that they work for us, not that we work for them.   We can organize and educate each other, the American public (which includes the millions of recent American citizens and those waiting to become citizens) about what is occurring in our legislative process, those liberties that we are losing and the unsustainable debt we are facing. We need to act, to expose the abuses and put the pressure on our legislators to regain what is rightfully ours; life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.  We need all Americans to stand up and fight to help preserve this great country.

 95% of the citizens approached in our region of Indiana agreed with the Tea Party principals.  Some could not come to the Tea Parties for various reasons but they were there in spirit.  So Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the Tea Parties are not an “astroturf movement” as you so eloquently stated, they are a grassroots movement.  Newt Gingrich stated on Fox News that he thinks “30% of Americans want the massive growth of the new administrations government programs, 70% do not.”   I would think that the 30% who want this massive growth of government will not want it when they see the results 10 years down the road.   The debt is unsustainable and they and their descendents will suffer from the current administrations’ actions.

 We are the silent majority. Many of us have our ancestral roots with the founding fathers and the patriots that fought during the American Revolution, who framed the Constitution and helped bring this great nation into existence.  We also have in our families those that served and some who have died to preserve American freedom.  We are not cowards as the present administration would want the world to believe. So we say, don’t poke the bear.  

 Both political parties are at fault.  It was under both of their watches that the spending went out of control, government meddled too much in the market place and the laws already on the books were not being enforced.  

 However, the present administration is creating potentially disastrous scenarios.  Many voters admit they made a mistake by voting for an administration that within 90 days: 

1. Voted in a far left socialist agenda;
2. Who is apologizing for America and saying we are an arrogant people and a nation of cowards;
3. Who is growing our debt and creating massive government programs that will spiral out of control;
4. Cutting defense spending to the bone and severely weakening our military defenses;
5. The new head of Homeland Security stating in a report “the return of military veterans facing significant challenges reintegrating into their community could lead to the potential emergence of terrorist groups or lone wolf extremists capable of carrying out violent attacks;
6. An administration that is unwilling to drill for oil here in America or build nuclear facilities to make us energy independent from foreign influences. They want us to depend on expensive solar panels, windmills that can be blown away in a tornado, grow corn for fuel which should be used for food, and to put air in our tires. Even though alternative energy sources can add to our energy needs, developing them exclusively will greatly weaken our economy.
7. Government taking over businesses, firing CEO’s, controls what someone in the private sector can earn.
8. Giving up Jefferson’s great American experiment.

Source: The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel) By Craig Gilbert, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Apr. 1–WASHINGTON — Many of the foreign leaders meeting with President Barack Obama at Thursday’s G-20 summit in London believe the global recession has discredited “U.S.-style” laissez-faire capitalism and want America to take a more activist and “European” approach to regulating financial markets.

But back home, conservatives have been making a different argument about the U.S. and European systems.

Rep. Paul Ryan of Janesville and other Republicans have assailed Obama’s budget as an effort to “Europeanize” America.

“This budget does propose to bring us toward a European-style form of government,” Ryan said Tuesday at a forum organized by the libertarian Cato Institute, as Congress began debate this week on the federal budget.

Ryan put the case more pointedly at a committee meeting last week, saying the Democratic budget plans could alter “the unique character of America and Americans” and trade “much of our freedom in exchange for Washington taking over much of our lives.”

Said Ryan: “If we accept this path and this agenda comes to pass, it will mark this period in our history as the moment where we begin to give up on Jefferson’s great American experiment, and transition to the European model will begin in earnest.”

 An administration whose health care reform is creating the largest government power grab in American History.  From the Heritage Foundation website, an article “Quoting from Learning from Vermont on health care” by Dennis G.  Smith  “President Obama’s health care budget proposal is large but surprisingly unimaginative. It depends on old-fashioned, populist, “soak the rich” tax hikes combined with technocratic tinkering with administrative payment and new software in anticipation of program savings. It does very little to change America’s flawed public and private third-party payment arrangements, where value is secured for “payers,” not individual patients. If the President wants to affect real change—and secure value for individual patients rather than third party payers—he should take concrete steps to transfer direct control over health care dollars and decisions to individuals and families.”  

 Etc, etc.  the list goes on and on.

 Whoever voted for this administration did not do their homework, nor did they understand what or who they were voting for; likewise for past administrations’ policies and leadership mistakes. In a year and half we can vote in economically fiscal conservatives, those that would govern by the constitution and begin to correct these mistakes; or at least slow down some of the damage that has been done.  But it will take much effort and sacrifice.  It may mean activities such as a nationwide march on Washington D.C.  Everyone needs to jump on board, for change is coming and together we can make it happen.

 A book called “A Miracle that Changed the World, the 5000 Year Leap: Principles of Freedom 101” author W. Cleon Skousen.   Ronald Reagan-President of the United States stated  “The National Center for Constitutional Studies.. is doing a fine public service in educating Americans about the principles of the Constitution.”

 In this book are emphasized 28 governing points that we should ponder as we participate in our Tax Tea Parties.

 “Principles of Liberty: Learn how adherence to these principles during the past 200 years has brought about more progress than was made in the previous 5,000 years. 

1.  The only reliable basis for sound government and just human relations is Natural     Law.

2.  Life and liberty are secure only so long as the right of property is secure.

3.  The burden of debt is as destructive to freedom as subjugation by conquest.

4.  The proper role of government is to protect equal rights, not provide equal things.

5.  A free people cannot survive under a republican constitution unless they remain virtuous and morally strong.

6 The most promising method of securing a virtuous and morally stable people is to elect virtuous leaders.

7. The highest level of prosperity occurs when there is a free market economy and a minimum of government regulations.

8. Only limited and carefully defined powers should be delegated to the government, all others being retained in the people.

9.  Without religion the government of a free people cannot be maintained.

10. The majority of the people may alter or abolish a government which has become tyrannical.

11.  All things were created by God, therefore upon Him all mankind are equally dependent, and to Him they are equally responsible.

12.  All men are created equal.

13. Men are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.

14.  To protect man’s rights, God has revealed certain principles of divine law.

15. The God-given right to govern is vested in the sovereign authority of the whole people.

16. The United States of America shall be a republic.

17. A constitution should be structured to permanently protect the people from the human fragilities of their rulers.

18. The government should be separated into three branches: legislative, executive, and judicial.

19. A system of checks and balances should be adopted to prevent the abuse of power.

20. The unalienable rights of the people are most likely to be preserved if the principles of government are set forth in a written constitution.

21. Efficiency and dispatch require government to operate according to the will of the majority, but constitutional provisions must be made to protect the rights of the minority.

22. Strong local self-government is the keystone to preserving human freedom.

23. A free people should be governed by law and not by the whims of men.

24. A free society cannot survive as a republic without a broad program of general education.

25. A free people will not survive unless they stay strong.

26. “Peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations: entangling alliances with none”.

27. The core unit which determines the strength of any society is the family; therefore, the government should foster and protect its integrity.

28. The United States has a manifest destiny to be an example and a blessing to the entire human race.”

 

Health Care Takeover… It’s the Ideology Stupid

Healthcare Take Over.. It’s the Ideology Stupid

By: Jeff Petersen

Today many around the nation are rallying together to make their voices heard in opposition to the idea of Uncle Sam taking over the health care industry. I know that many do not like to call it a take over but that is exactly what it is. The liberal left hates the idea of individual choice unless it deals with women killing their unborn babies. The liberal left loves bureaucracy. The liberal left hates freedom. The voices that are rising up today are not those of the liberal left but of working (well some may be out of a job at the moment) Americans who hold to the idea that our Constitution does not support the government taking over any part of the private sector; not the auto industry, and certainly not health care.

From 1200EST-1:00PM EST, grassroots movements around the country will be protesting at government offices across the nation. The Tea Party Patriots are one of these groups. The truth of the matter is that everyone who reads this article (maybe it will only reach 300 people) should make an effort to keep this “reform” from happening. So if you were unable (like I am) to make it to one of the protests, then call the Senators and the Representative that represent you. You can find their contact information by clicking the link contact your representative right here on my blog.

In doing some research I found that the House version of this bill actually has a provision in it that will allow community organizations (read ACORN) to survey you based on your weight, your lifestyle, and your need for health care! My dear readers, this is yet another power grab by a hungry group of statists and progressives who truly believe that Big Brother can run your life better than you can. The liberal left wants to control your healthcare; this same liberal left is in full support of allowing women to kill their unborn babies on demand and is often found on the side of supporting euthanasia. Do you want this type of person making life and DEATH decisions for you? Remember that the socialist/communist mantra is based on the good of the community not the individual. If these are the people who run healthcare you would do well to never get sick and to stay productive (helping the community).

This legislation is also very expensive. I will not address the idea that healthcare is a right in this particular article. The bill that passed the House does not even satisfy the goal of insuring every American. What will happen is we will spend the money of working men and women to the tune of at least 1.5 trillion dollars. 1,500,000,000,000 dollars.  How is spending 1.5 trillion dollars going to save people money?  If taxes must be raised to pay for this behemoth legislation how is that saving people money?  Then there is the fear that 1.5 trillion is actually what it will cost or if the bureaucracy, that is sure to rise out of this system, doesn’t drive the costs higher. That is what happened with Medicare. I am sure history won’t repeat itself.

Another thing to consider is how invasive this new legislation will be. This bill is more about ideology than it is about practicality. It is about taking away choices away from individuals and giving them to a bureaucrat. It will no longer be a question about what your doctor thinks, or even what you think. Uncle Sam will decide if you really need to have that lump looked at. You are fooling yourself if you don’t think an Excel spreadsheet will be used to figure out if you are worthy of healthcare… put age into cell A1, weight into cell C44, taxes paid in last FY in cell AA22, political affiliation in cell R1. Presto.. coverage denied.

Lastly, it is about closing down the private sector. This bill, in tandem with Cap and Trade, is designed to repress small businesses and entrepreneurs. I know it is hard to believe but the liberal left is for BIG business. Why? Because BIG business can be manipulated. This bill is a scam. It is meant to drive private insurance companies out of the private sector. It is simply a lie that the progressives do not want to take full control. Of course they do. Though most people are unaware, there is a big push by the left to cease 401ks and replace them with an upgraded social security program. The liberal left and our political elite feel that you, the working men and women of our country, need to be managed. Our founding fathers would roll over in their graves.

This is a fundamental right we have as citizens of the United States. I am calling on you to fight for our country. My children are depending on you. Call, call, fax, fax, email, write, call your Senators… your representative… Let them know.. That you, the American taxpayer, have had ENOUGH.

 

Ask not what your country can do for you…

Remember that famous quote from John F. Kennedy in his inaugural address? That famous line, “Ask not what your country can do for you, but ask what you can do for your country,” has been repeated by many different people over the past 48 years in a variety of contexts and for a variety of purposes. But it seems that we have forgotten it, and are only asking what our country or our government can do for us.

During this past election cycle, I got in a conversation with someone who was planning on voting for Obama and basically an entire Democrat and/or liberal ticket. She asked me why I was going to vote Republican, because “what have the Republicans ever given you?” I’ve thought about that question a lot in the past several months, and found it to give insight into the reason why government is so big, why they take so much from us in taxes, and why they are elected into office again and again, despite their massive failures. [Massive failures? Yes! Pres. Johnson declared “War on Poverty” in the 60s, and it’s only gotten worse. Yet we continue to throw good money after bad, in the apparent insane hopes that maybe this time history won’t repeat itself. And that’s just one example.]

This woman didn’t realize it, but she was selling her vote to the highest bidder — to whomever was able to convince her that s/he was going to give her the most. In one way, that’s not too different from what everyone does — everyone votes for the person that s/he thinks is the best. The difference comes in the way someone determines who will be the best candidate for the job. It’s an easy thing to vote for someone who promises you to “give” you what you want (even if, like so many campaign promises, the promise is forgotten the day after the election). It’s much harder — requires more discipline, more maturity, more circumspection, more thought — to vote for someone who does not promise you the moon.

But it is important to remember, that “the government” cannot give unless it first takes. They take our money in the form of taxes, then they take a percentage of our money off the top for bureaucracy, then they give us back a smaller portion of our money in the form of “benefits” and services. Some taxation is necessary, and some benefits and services are needful; but it’s time to say enough already!!!

We have to step up and let our voice be heard. A reader named Craig sent the link to this news story about various Representatives and Senators going apoplectic about proposed budget cuts, because the cuts were going to affect their districts. One of the items was a Presidential helicopter that Obama says is not necessary. Although $800,000,000 is a drop in the bucket, compared to the monstrosity of the “stimulus” package, it is still eight hundred million dollars of your money and my money that will be spent unnecessarily unless it is ultimately cut. And it will be spent because people voted, not for what they could do for their country, but what their country could do for them. Unfortunately, that comes at a very steep price, because as I said before, the government cannot give anything that it does not first take away.

 

Wall Street Journal Nails It

Did the Obama Administration overstep its Constitutional bounds, in the dealings with Chrysler? That is the topic of an editorial written by Todd Zywicki, which appears in the Wall Street Journal. Entitled “Chrysler and the Rule of Law,” Mr. Zywicki explores the ramifications of what the current President has done, not just for Chrysler, its shareholders and financiers today, but also for all businesses of all types in the future.

The Obama administration’s behavior in the Chrysler bankruptcy is a profound challenge to the rule of law. Secured creditors — entitled to first priority payment under the “absolute priority rule” — have been browbeaten by an American president into accepting only 30 cents on the dollar of their claims. Meanwhile, the United Auto Workers union, holding junior creditor claims, will get about 50 cents on the dollar.

Later on, he says,

By stepping over the bright line between the rule of law and the arbitrary behavior of men, President Obama may have created a thousand new failing businesses. That is, businesses that might have received financing before but that now will not, since lenders face the potential of future government confiscation. In other words, Mr. Obama may have helped save the jobs of thousands of union workers whose dues, in part, engineered his election. But what about the untold number of job losses in the future caused by trampling the sanctity of contracts today?

The value of the rule of law is not merely a matter of economic efficiency. It also provides a bulwark against arbitrary governmental action taken at the behest of politically influential interests at the expense of the politically unpopular. The government’s threats and bare-knuckle tactics set an ominous precedent for the treatment of those considered insufficiently responsive to its desires. Certainly, holdout Chrysler creditors report that they felt little confidence that the White House would stop at informal strong-arming.

If American businesses are not safe from “arbitrary governmental action,” can the American public be?

Remember, also, that Chrysler was one of many companies that got money from the government — that’s our money, folks — just a few short months ago, which will probably never be repaid. That means that our children will have to repay for the stupidity of our elected officials’ actions.

 

Ripley, MS, TEA Party

Earlier, Chuck gave his perspective on the TEA Party he helped organize [in seven days] in Ripley, Mississippi. Here is the video of the rally, with speaker Les Riley.

 

A Call to Conservatives

The government has gotten too much control away from the people — we are fast becoming an oligarchy and we don’t even know it. When they speak of right-wing groups being dangerous because we want states’ rights, they may be correct. But it is not because we are wrong, but because we are right. The only thing that has kept the federal government at bay this long is that our states were more independent. Now, our states’ rights are being eroded on a daily basis, and no one seems to be noticing or caring — and the people who do care are now being labeled dangerous conspirators. We are not dangerous to the government created and restrained by the Constitution, but rather to the government that has thrown off the restraints of the Constitution, which serve to keep us a free people — free not from outside enemies, but from inside enemies, and from the government itself.

We have forgotten the famous (and truthful) quotes of past leaders — “That government is best which governs least”; “America is great because she is good. When America ceases to be good, she will cease to be great”; “Power corrupts; and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” We are fast heading towards a government with absolute power, and it is guaranteed to be absolutely corrupt. May God have mercy on this country.